Hawaii - James Michener [224]
Holding the sacred rock of Pele aloft, she cried, "Pele! Great goddess! You are destroying the town of those who love you! I pray you to halt!"
And standing there with the stone aloft, she watched new fires reach the ugly snout and start to gush forward toward the town of Hilo, and as the fires trembled, she threw into them tobacco, and two bottles of brandy which flamed furiously, and four red scarves, for that was a color Pele loved, and a red rooster and finally a lock of her own hair. And the fires of Pele hung in the snout, consumed the tobacco, and slowly froze into position. The flow of lava had halted at Noelani's feet, but there were no cheers, only the soft prayers of all who had trusted that Pele would never destroy the town of Hilo. The fires went out. The probing fingers consumed no more homes, and in a daze of glory and confusion Noelani returned to her ship and went once more to Lahaina, there to await the birth of the child who, when she was gone, would take her place as intercessor with the gods.
This halting of the lava was the worst single blow Abner Hale experienced in Lahaina, for coming so quickly after the defection of Keoki and his sister, it was interpreted as confirming their marriage; while Noelani's demonstrated ability to influence the ancient gods convinced Hawaiians that they still survived, and many began drifting away from the Christian church. But what hurt Abner most was the hilarity with which Americans greeted the miracle. One profane captain kept shouting, "From here on count me a firm believer in Madame Pele!" Another promised, "Now if Noelani will only take care of the storms, I'll join her church, too."
Abner, suffering at each defection from his church and wincing at the American jibes, became obsessed with the lava incident and went about arguing with anyone who would listen: "The burning rock came so far and stopped. What's so miraculous about that?"
"Ah, but who stopped it?" his tormentors would parry.
"A woman stands before a nose of lava as it's about to die down, and that's a miracle," he snorted contemptuously.
"Ah, but what if she hadn't been there?" the logicians queried.
After some weeks Abner went at last, and grudgingly, to consult with John Whipple, and the young scientist reassured him. "When the internal pressures of a volcano become powerful enough, they erupt into violence. Depending solely upon the interior forces within the earth, and nothing more, lava is spewed forth and rolls down mountainsides. If there's enough lava, it's got to reach the ocean. If there isn't, it stops somewhere en route."
"Are these things known?" Abner asked.
"By anyone with a grain of intelligence," Whipple replied. "Look at Lanai. Anyone can see it was a volcano once. Look at our own Maui. At one time it had to be two separate volcanoes, gradually coalescing along that line. I would guess that at some time all the separate islands we see from this pier were one great island."
"How could that have been?" Abner queried.
"Either the islands sank or the sea rose. Either explanation would do."
The grandeur of this concept was too difficult for Abner to accept, and he retreated to certainty: "We know that the world was created four thousand and four years before the birth of Christ, and there is no record of islands having risen or fallen." The idea was repugnant to him.
Whipple was going to ask about the Flood, but he changed the subject and casually remarked, "Abner, why did you put yourself in such a bad light at the marriage of Keoki and Noelani? You surrendered a lot of influence that week."
"It was an abomination, unnatural, unclean!" Abner stormed.
"I've been thinking about it a great deal," Whipple reflected. "What's so dreadful about it? Now really, don't quote me incidents from the Bible. Just tell me."
"It's abhorrent and unnatural," Abner